Interviewees include Robert McNamara, Brent Scowcroft, James Schlesinger and Last Strategic Air Commander-in-Chief Lee Butler. Includes Revelations on "Out of Control" Nuclear Targeting During the 1980s.

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 361

Disk 1, 1945-1954: Chapters 1 through 9

These chapters cover the story of nuclear weapons policy from the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to the emergence of "massive retaliation" during the first years of the Eisenhower Administration. Besides the atomic bombings, some of the key moments in the chapters are the Berlin Crisis (1948), the origins of nuclear deterrence policy, the impact of the Soviet atomic test (1949) and the Korean War, Eisenhower's "Basic National Security Policy" the development of thermonuclear weapons and the implications for "nuclear plenty."

U.S. Army Air Force bombing operations during World War II usefully frame the early chapters, with Lynn Eden and Robert McNamara explaining how they informed nuclear strategy, including basic concepts of deterrence. For example, Eden discusses the impact of World War II on target categories and the calculation bombing damage, with blast effects becoming the chief measure of destruction. Taking the generally accepted view that the fire bombings of Japanese of Tokyo helped to legitimate the strategy of atomic strikes against more Japanese cities, the narrative treats the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a "culmination." According to George Quester, the "basis of deterrence" can be found in the atomic bombings. He argues that some Japanese government officials would have said to themselves, "I can't stand seeing that many people killed." In other words, the prospect of further destruction deterred Tokyo from continuing the war.

The coverage of the atomic bombings includes an oversight and an error. The only observation about the impact of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings is Admiral Wertheim's assertion that they were decisive for ending World War II in the Pacific--"tipped the scale" as he put it. Wertheim is entitled to his opinion, but letting his words shape the narrative makes one wonder what happened to the Soviet declaration of war on Japan, 8 August 1945, Historical debate continues over what exactly led to the surrender of Japan, but no one disagrees that the Soviet declaration had a critically important impact1 and it should have been mentioned to avoid perpetuating a myth. An error creeps in when the narrator refers to—and the viewer sees---a memorandum from Truman to Secretary of War Stimson, 31 July 1945, as the "release order" for the use of the bombs. This memorandum was, in fact, a reference to a press release that was to be issued after the first bomb was detonated.2

To put the history of U.S. nuclear strategy in context, the film's narrator points to three major variables. The first is the impact of successive presidential administrations. The second is the pressure caused by changing world events. The third is the evolutionary development of nuclear weapons systems. These are relevant to understanding the history, but the editor could have taken into account an additional variable: the concepts of national security that influenced policymakers and helped shaped their decisions. While a film like this cannot go into this matter very deeply, it could have acknowledged the ideological, economic, and strategic concerns that made U.S. top officials believe that the United States had to play a major role in world politics and which shaped the diplomatic and military strategies of presidential administrations throughout the Cold War. Indeed, without taking into account the strategic interests which U.S. policymakers had already fought world wars to secure it is difficult to understand why they would even consider making the threats that comprised nuclear deterrence.3

On the context for nuclear policy immediately after World War II, Paul Boyer helpfully captures the "ambivalence" of U.S. security policy and diplomacy. That the U.S only had a handful of "functional" nuclear weapons during 1945-1947 exemplified the ambivalence. So did the Truman administration's proposals for international control of atomic energy, although the degree to which the Baruch Plan set back the possibility of control goes unmentioned.4

David Holloway makes fine contributions on Stalin and Soviet policy, but the narrative on the origins and early phases of the Cold War is workmanlike and traditional. It is largely a story of Soviet expansion with little hint of the considerations (concern about European stability and other national security objectives) that led the Truman administration to engage in a Cold War with the Soviet Union. The coverage of nuclear strategy is stronger, with the Berlin crisis treated as a "driver" (and as David Holloway explains, Stalin's reaction to Western moves to create a separate West German state). The emergence of the Strategic Air Command as a force that was being prepared to fight a nuclear war gets appropriate weight as does the key role of General Curtis LeMay in building the new organization.

The discussion of early nuclear planning is fascinating and so are the details on the early war plans--Half-Moon and Offtackle, and their relationship to World War II targeting. Lynn Eden explains the major target categories (Bravo: nuclear forces, Delta: urban-industrial, and Romeo: mobilization capabilities), although her explanation should have been used in a post-1950 context when those categories became integral to SAC planning. The chapter on "How Much is Enough for Deterrence" shows how "keeping ahead" of Moscow became important and why momentum for the H-bomb decision became compelling at the White House level.

The Korean War and the decisions on NSC 68 increased pressure for "Building the 'Super.'" John S. Foster credits Edward Teller as the "driving force" in the thermonuclear weapons program, although he does not show how stymied Teller and the H-bomb project were before Stanislas Ulam introduced the concept of compressing deuterium. Nevertheless, Ulam's contribution is made clear enough. The major focus is not on the inventors, but the impact of the H-bomb on the weapons stockpile. As Richard Garwin points out, with the H-bomb it became "possible to have vastly more weapons with a limited stock of "fissional material. The film footage of H-bomb tests illustrates their terrifying power, but what nuclear planners thought they would do does not get clear treatment. Nevertheless, a major Project RAND report declared that "thermonuclear weapons will be killers and fantastically destructive." "The heat will be sufficient to kill people and start fires miles from the point of burst."5

The discussion of "Basic National Security Policy" and nuclear deterrence during the Eisenhower administration cites NSC 162 for the position that nuclear weapons were "available for use as other weapons." This amounted to a repudiation of Truman's firm conviction that the atomic bomb was an "an instrument of terror and a weapon of last resort." Truman's post-Nagasaki revulsion to nuclear weapons use is not spelled out very sharply except for references to his "apprehension" and his "personal understanding of the damage" that nuclear weapons would do. Nevertheless, Truman's thinking would become typical as a "taboo" against nuclear use became institutionalized owing to the impact of world and domestic opinion, alliance politics, and the moral concerns of policymakers. Indeed, by the end of the 1950s, a more experienced Eisenhower had come to believe that nuclear weapons could not be used as "other weapons." As he put it in 1958, "when you use nuclear weapons you cross a completely different line."6

Notes1The argument has been over the importance of the Soviet declaration of war compared to the atomic bombings. See Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005) and Hasegawa, ed., The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007).2Sean L. Malloy, Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), 217, note 68.3See, for example, Melvyn P. Leffler, A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1992) and Walter LaFeber, America, Russia and the Cold War, 1945-2000 (New York; McGraw Hill, 2002).4See James. G. Hershberg, James B. Conant: From Harvard to Hiroshima and the Making of the Nuclear Age (New York: Knopf., 1993): 263-2695RAND Corporation, "Implications of Large-Yield Nuclear Weapons," 10 July 1952, copy on Digital National Security Archive.6Matthew Jones, After Hiroshima the United States, Race, and Nuclear Weapons in Asia, 1945-1965 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 271, 277. For the nuclear taboo more generally, see Nina Tannenwald, The Nuclear Taboo: The United States and the Non-Use of Nuclear Weapons Since 1945 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009).

These materials are reproduced from www.nsarchive.org with the permission of the National Security Archive.

Not a newsblog, Geopolitiek in perspectief, which was launched 15 March 2010, provides background, analysis and comment on world affairs. Some articles are based on less well known but proven historic facts and are therefore of permanent value. These posts are provided with the label "documentaire". Egbert Talens’ documentary contributions were additionally allocated an own label.

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"In an age of media concentration, embedded journalism and political spin, Geopolitiek in perspectiefprovides concise texts designed to paint an independent picture of the changing balance of power in the world and the areas where the struggle for power occurs. The blog, which is open to contributions from guest authors, is particularly focused on the Middle East conflicts and the Israel-US special relationship."

“La guerra contra la democracia” (“The War on Democracy”) is a documentary film made by the Australian reporter John Pilger. The documentary focuses on the intrusion of the United States into political affairs in Latin America, mainly in Venezuela. It shows, through the presentation of documents and interviews, the participation of the CIA in the coups against Hugo Chavez, as well as against Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala and Salvador Allende in Chile. This is a must see to understand events in Venezuela today.

Washington and Tel Aviv lurching toward a war with Iran

In Iran, as elsewhere, US imperialism seeks to counter the decline of its economic domination through a turn to military aggression. While the European capitalist powers have joined in US military actions, particularly with the participation of the UK and France in the April 14 missile attack on Syria, their hopes of reaping a share of the booty from imperialist intervention can never be realized by serving as the tail of the American dog. Inevitably, they must turn to their own rearmament for a struggle of each against all for the redivision of the world. This process is already well under way.Bill Van Auken, 2 May 2018

Debate on US new nuclear weapons strategy

In this edition of The Debate, Press TV has conducted an interview with Marcus Papadopoulos, a publisher and an editor of Politics First from London, and Jonathan Fryer, a writer and lecturer from London, to discuss Washington’s plan to revamp its nuclear arsenal with smaller atomic weapons.

There is No FSA, There is Only Al-Qaeda

If indeed the US ever had a binary choice between supporting the Assad government, on the one hand, or extremists from al-Qaeda on the other, it is clear that in fact the US chose to support al-Qaeda, in the form of Nusra. US planners did so in an effort to topple the Assad government and thereby weaken its main regional rivals Iran and Hezbollah. Unsurprisingly, US intervention in Syria has had terrible consequences for the Syrian people, as the conflict between the rebels and the Syrian army has ruined much of the country. Such an outcome was easy to predict, and yet US planners funneled massive amounts of weapons into the country, typically by way of their Saudi and Qatari partners. Further, living under al-Qaeda rule is not something that Syrians, including Syrian Sunnis, welcome, and yet US planners supported the growth of al-Qaeda in Syria in order to accomplish its own foreign policy goals. It is often claimed that US planners seek to “stabilize” the Middle East. However, the US intervention in Syria serves as yet one more reminder that US policy in the region has sought to do just the opposite, at the cost of great human suffering for Syrians, as it did for Iraqis and Libyans before them.

From zero to hero: how Jeremy Corbyn resuscitated UK Labour against all odds

Jeremy Corbyn is now more popular than Ed Miliband and armed with confidence, direction and a bloody good programme, a miraculous turnaround in no time at all. Whatever happens, the idea that this leader could get thisfar with thisprogramme should shut up the neoliberal left and Blairites within Labour once and for all, shifting what is politically plausible in the UK to the left in the process.Jamie Mackay, 7 June 2017

The Corbyn surge was no fantasy. But what does it mean for the UK?

[The Labour campaign] was grounded in a real social vision that understood and proposed convincing solutions to the continuing legacy of the financial crash, the cruelty of state policies on the weakest that are specific to the UK. John Harris’s documentaries for the Guardian go to the real heart of this bleak reality and the vision for change. Look, for example, at the outdoor Corbyn rally in Gateshead on 5 June (11:16), which was ram-packed despite torrential January-like rain. Here you’ll see the drenched faces of young, old, white, black and a roughly 50/50 gender balance. When such a demographic and in such large numbers supports a manifesto like that put forth by Corbyn, the centre ground has well and truly shifted.

The young, on social media, but also in the streets and real life meetings, are bypassing the old forms of power and patronage and beginning to set a new political agenda. It was they who lead this fight, and they did so not out of radical chic pretentions but with discipline in order to contribute to building a more empathic society.Jamie Mackay, 9 June 2017

Israel and Palestine won’t get a two-state solution under Donald Trump

But they may get something better

The greatest guarantor of a society’s stability, prosperity, and sovereignty is its ability to provide all those under its rule with a genuine sense of dignity and equality.Instead of erasing national, cultural, or religious differences, Israel needs to find an intelligent way to forge a shared future. This future nation would likely need to be transformed into a binational state with significant degrees of autonomy for its diverse citizenry collectively, and robust rights for the individual.Haroon Moghul, December 21, 2016

Bush Military Official: The Empire's Ship is Sinking

Syria conundrum: Russian bear roars as the West slides

… the [S-400] deployment is not merely an act of tightening of Russian air defense. A closer look at it suggests its other significance. Certainly, Russia is not going to use these missiles against IS or any other terrorist organization. The only actors these missiles can potentially be used against are the States involved in Syria.It is, as such, a clear message to them. In fact, the very location of deployment tells the whole story plainly. From Khmeimim airbase - which is only 30 miles from Turkish border - S-400 radar covers Syria, western regions of Iraq and Saudi Arabia, nearly all of Israel and Jordan, Egypt’s northern Sinai, a large part of the eastern Mediterranean and Turkish airspace as far as the capital Ankara.Therefore, it cannot be gainsaid that this deployment has literally turned almost the whole of Syria into a “no fly zone” for US led coalition air strikes.Salman Rafi, 30 November 2015

Mehdi Hasan calls out EU leaders for turning their back on the thousands fleeing conflict

Refugees don’t need our tears. They need us to stop making them refugees

But equally important is responsibility. In all the rage about migration, one thing is never discussed: what we do to cause it. A report published this week by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists reveals that the World Bank displaced a staggering 3.4 million people in the last five years. By funding privatisations, land grabs and dams, by backing companies and governments accused of rape, murder and torture, and by putting $50bn into projects graded highest risk for “irreversible and unprecedented” social impacts, the World Bank has massively contributed to the flow of impoverished people across the globe. The single biggest thing we could do to stop migration is to abolish the development mafia: the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, European Investment Bank and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.A very close second is to stop bombing the Middle East. The west destroyed the infrastructure of Libya without any clue as to what would replace it. What has is a vacuum state run by warlords that is now the centre of Mediterranean people-smuggling. We’re right behind the Sisi regime in Egypt that is eradicating the Arab spring, cracking down on Muslims and privatising infrastructure at a rate of knots, all of which pushes huge numbers of people on to the boats. Our past work in Somalia, Syria and Iraq means those nationalities are top of the migrant list.Anders Lustgarten, 17 April 2015

“I wish to resign and cease considering myself a Jew.”

…In fact, our relation to those who are second-class citizens of Israel is inextricably bound up with our relation to those who live in immense distress at the bottom of the chain of the Zionist rescue operation. That oppressed population, which has lived under the occupation for close to 50 years, deprived of political and civil rights, on land that the “state of the Jews” considers its own, remains abandoned and ignored by international politics. I recognise today that my dream of an end to the occupation and the creation of a confederation between two republics, Israeli and Palestinian, was a chimera that underestimated the balance of forces between the two parties.

Increasingly it appears to be already too late; all seems already lost, and any serious approach to a political solution is deadlocked. Israel has grown used to this, and is unable to rid itself of its colonial domination over another people. The world outside, unfortunately, does not do what is needed either. Its remorse and bad conscience prevent it from convincing Israel to withdraw to the 1948 frontiers. Nor is Israel ready to annex the occupied territories officially, as it would then have to grant equal citizenship to the occupied population and, by that fact alone, transform itself into a binational state. It’s rather like the mythological serpent that swallowed too big a victim, but prefers to choke rather than to abandon it…